


Batman: Specter

by batmandragon42



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman and Robin (Comics), Under the Red Hood
Genre: Batman - Freeform, Dick Grayson is Nightwing, Gen, Jason Todd is Dead, Jason Todd is Red Hood, Jason Todd is Robin, Murder Mystery, Mystery, Tim Drake is Robin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-18
Updated: 2017-07-19
Packaged: 2018-12-03 21:12:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 2,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11540529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/batmandragon42/pseuds/batmandragon42
Summary: March 3, 19XXHugo,Happy 10th birthday! I apologize if I can’t be here at the moment to properly congratulate you, but I’m afraid that you’re already used to it by the time that you’re reading this.And, if you are reading this, then I thank you for actually deciding to read a letter from someone that you’ve probably lost faith in by this point.I believe that at the moment that you’re reading this you are finally old enough to understand everything that has happened to me thus far (considering the time that I’m writing this) and how that leads to you being where you are now. Again, I’m afraid that all I can do is apologize at the moment, but I hope that in reading my account you can at least give me some forgiveness.Before you begin reading, I have one more request of you. After reading this account, it’s in your best interest to burn it, along with this letter, and any evidence of this at all. If not, there could be involvement of unnecessary parties, and believe me when I say that you don’t want that.Best wishes,Elizabeth





	1. Prologue 1

**March 3, 19XX**

**Hugo,**

**Happy 10 th birthday! I apologize if I can’t be here at the moment to properly congratulate you, but I’m afraid that you’re already used to it by the time that you’re reading this.**

**And, if you are reading this, then I thank you for actually deciding to read a letter from someone that you’ve probably lost faith in by this point.**

**I believe that at the moment that you’re reading this you are finally old enough to understand everything that has happened to me thus far (considering the time that I’m writing this) and how that leads to you being where you are now. Again, I’m afraid that all I can do is apologize at the moment, but I hope that in reading my account you can at least give me some forgiveness.**

**Before you begin reading, I have one more request of you. After reading this account, it’s in your best interest to burn it, along with this letter, and any evidence of this at all. If not, there could be involvement of unnecessary parties, and believe me when I say that you don’t want that.**

**Best wishes,**

**Elizabeth**


	2. Prologue 2

_October 16, 19XX_

_Finally arrived in Gotham today. Oliver won’t stop crying. I regret taking him. At least Frank is never around, or he would’ve kicked us out long ago. Let’s hope it stays like that. I don’t trust him._

_I’m disgusted with myself. Not that I didn’t expect that things would turn out this way, but I figured that I could save it a little longer._

_I need to find a better spot to hide out. I could leave Oliver here when Frank isn’t home, but this house is practically begging to be broken into. I don’t know what I could do if Oliver is found. Several states away is nothing in this age._

_I’ve already forgotten where I dropped the car off, but it doesn’t really matter. The damn thing’s going to get stolen again anyway._

_All I know at the moment is that I plan on leaving tomorrow, and that there is no way I’m going to sleep here tonight. I’ll pay for a motel room if I have to._

 

_$35.17_

_-  $1.50_

_\------------_

_$33.67_


	3. Prologue 3

**_October 16, 19XX_ **

****

**_Appointment with Markus Reid yielded nothing, just as expected. Had to cling to the classic “Just a figurehead” line to avoid perpetuating his monopoly on the marijuana supply of the East. I’m sure the board would’ve agreed with me if they knew what I knew._ **

**_As per account, Reid talks to much. We don’t leave until 12:30. I meet Dick at a mugging. She could’ve been saved. Tim thinks so to._ **

**_Dick handles the technicalities. Tim and I have an hour before Reid. It will not go to waste. We encounter a group of teenagers at a local park. Not where any teenager would be at 12:45._ **

**_Tim and I give them a chance. They look like kids who’ll talk. They decide to walk the harder path. This will not end well. I remind Tim to hold back._ ** ****

**_I know that I can’t stop the youth of the drug market. That decision is ultimately up to the kids._ ** ****

**_But I can provide guidance._ **


	4. Prologue 4

October 16, 19XX

 

There’s always a distinct way of telling if a police officer is new at the station. 

Whenever they that the local mugger or rapist has been tied up with bungee cord, with the frightened victim reporting a large bat swooping in to save their life, they report it as “a crime scene à la Batman”.

Nowadays, we just call it a crime scene. 

I often here boys at the station talking about how unsettling it is that the Batman knows more than we ever could. I used to wonder to myself if he ever removed something from a crime scene. 

Now I know he does.

Still, he’s one of the only allies that lawmen have today. Even the people we defend use to trust us.

Though, I don’t believe that anything Batman does could be considered as “trusting”.


	5. Letter Part 1

**First, I’d like to make something clear. Your name is Oliver. Never forget that. Everyone in your life will call you Hugo, and if we ever meet, I won’t be an exception. But you were born an Oliver.**

**The second thing that I’d like to make clear is that I am not your only sibling. You have a brother named Jason Todd.**

**We were born in Montana to a lawyer and his wife, though they could barely be considered parents. Jason had been with them the longest, and if you had heard what he told me, you wouldn’t have believed that he was related to them at all.**

**In all honesty, I’ve formed no opinions on them except that they were perfectly adequate, if a little strict. But Jason thought otherwise, and he made no mistake about showing it.**

**When I was 4, Jason finally got fed up with everything that our parents were forcing on him and lashed out at them with a knife. Most of the memories of my parents are lost in my consciousness, but I remember this as clear as day.**

**Jason was sent to a home for troubled kids in Gotham, where you are now.**

**A couple months after you were born, our house went up in flames. You were far too young to be able to remember it by now, but at the time that I’m writing this, it was only about a month ago.**

**From then on, you and I were put through the ringer. We were passed from orphanage to orphanage, family to family. Again, I don’t think your old enough to remember any of them, and I don’t remember any of them either. We didn’t stay in one place for more than a week.**

**It’s probably lurking somewhere in your subconscious, but I believe you can recall how terrible the treatment was. If you have ever known me, which you did once, you would’ve known that I wouldn’t have stood for something like this. But then they began to make you suffer as well.**

**The evening that triggered my leaving was when they refused to ration food properly and would’ve left you starving if I hadn’t reminded them. Shortly afterward, I hijacked a car and we traveled to the East Coast, Gotham.**

**My intention was to look for Jason. At the time that we would’ve arrived, Jason would’ve been an adult. Some would’ve called it cruel to spring this responsibility on Jason out of nowhere, but Jason always had a strong familial obligation, as long as you earned it. I know I keep repeating that you probably couldn’t have understood the course of events if you weren’t there, but trust me completely when I say that Jason was the kind of person that would’ve stood by someone to the ends of the Earth.**

**At the time, I hadn’t known exactly where he had been sent, but all I knew was that it was a home for troubled kids deep in the heart of Gotham, and that he would most likely be in college by now, if he’d ever managed to pick his life up.**

**Some might have said that I was looking at facts that support the conclusion, rather than vice versa, and in hindsight, I very much was. But there at this point we were so deep in desperation that anything would’ve satisfied me. The fact that I managed to haul myself to the confront the scum of the world in Gotham should’ve been proof of that enough.**

**Arriving in Gotham is one of the most vivid memories I have. Even if I hadn’t known where I was going, I would’ve known when I arrived in Gotham. It has such a distinct feel, that I’m sure you’re all to familiar with by now.**

**It’s not good feeling. It’s such a far cry from the optimistic West, where I had grown up. As soon as you enter, everything emanates being completely devoid of all hope. The sky is no longer a sky, it’s a curtain of filth that people take as the sky because they don’t have anything better to look up to when they wake up each morning. The passerby could be a newborn baby or the oldest man alive, but they all look decrepit, cynical, scared, or all three. Even the buildings don’t want you here, they just loom over the street, casting shadows without the sun.**

**Though, being the paradox it is, there’s never a dull moment in the monotonous Gotham.**

**Almost as soon as we arrived, you started crying, just like you had been for the entire ride. I guess I never knew how much of a burden a crying baby is, as this was the first time that you had left the car, and there was no way that we were going back.**

**My first order of business was to find a reasonable place to set up shop, and act as our Base of Operations. As you can imagine, it was very difficult. Of course, I have no doubt that I would’ve received many offers if I had just asked people, but considering the reputation that this city had made for itself, it was almost impossible to tell who to trust.**

**My original plans were to slum in an abandon building and find a job shortly afterward to keep our income up, which at the time was running low enough.**

**Unfortunately, we happened to land in the ultimate city of resourcefulness. Though there were plenty of buildings that were abandoned in the legal world, there was not one that hadn’t been hit by the plague of druggies, homeless people, fugitives, and the like. It was the most welcoming place for a person who could hold their own amongst them, and I’m sure you’ve already put together that there was no way that a baby and a teenage girl could defend themselves against a horde of people who’ve made a career out of harming others.**

**Eventually, at around 10:00 at night, I managed to pay a man, Frank, $40 to let us sleep in his home for the night. Though, “sleep” is a strong word, as neither you nor I slept a wink that evening. The only reason that I had chosen Frank as our temporary shelter was that he worked nights, and did live in a relatively populated area.**

**As soon as it was dawn, and possibly a little before that, we left. Frank wasn’t home at the time, and I’m thankful for that. Who knows what he would’ve done.**

*********

**You and I took breakfast in a café, and by this time, you had managed to calm down, though I barely had.**

**We spent a majority of the day hunting for a place to live. I managed to convince an old lady renting out a room that he could let me stay there for  a few days. I think I recall the lie that I told her that I was waiting for my parents to arrive and couldn’t find the hotel. I’m not entirely sure how that worked, but it managed to convince her to let me stay there, assuming that she was listening to what I was saying at all.**

**And before I reveal exactly how I managed to keep you safe without having you hate me even more than you possibly could at the moment, I apologize one more. However, if you could recall, the heating was worth it.**

**While I was discussing the terms of my residence in the lady’s building, I hid you in a dumpster behind the building that I had just seen being emptied. After the lady had agreed to let me stay for a couple days, I went to the room where I would be staying, climbed out the window and pulled you in.**

**As soon as I placed you on the couch in our room, you were out like a light. Though I didn’t completely trust leaving you there, it would certainly work out better for us in the long term.**

**The job hunt that I had that afternoon barely turned up a success, but I managed to land a weeknight job working at a café a half hour away from where we were living. Indeed, it paid low, but it could definitely support us if we left our provisions at, let’s be kind and say, minimalist proportions.**

**And now, my dear Oliver, this is where I could say our story actually begins, as it commences at the same time that my hunt for our brother does. I’m going to finish this background by making yet another grand request for forgiveness, as I’m not proud of most of the events that follow.**

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own anything related to Batman, I only own my own story and characters. Please leave feedback!


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